Dream Come True (Minus the Dirt): No Alternate Side Parking

danny hellman

That's fantastic news! Why not do away with all the sidewalks, so auto owners can double their parking opportunities?

eggcream

I'm sure you'll have tons of volunteers who work hard all day and have to clean their own home running out to clean the garbage up from slobs in the street, not. People are responsible for garbage in front of their own homes so they don't get a ticket and the City is responsible for the street cleaning.

Should the store owners clean outside their store or can the DOT clean the avenues?

How about snow removal? Will you remove the snow from the streets as well?

Street cleaning works. It's not 100% effective, people are the other factor. PS owners take pride in their homes ( they also don't want a ticket) so what the cleaner misses they pick up. Not every neighborhood is the same.

I would say instead of those horrible eye sore paper stands littering corners, we should have more garbage cans. P*sses me off to walk behind some idiot while they drop their gum wrappers, pizza plates etc on the sidewalk.

southslopesuit

On the one hand, we're lucky to have problems such as this... we'll live, I suppose.

On the other hand - this will suck! Suck suck suck.

And even if it did not suck - do you really mean to tell me that this is the best plan they could come up with? All at once? Months? How could this possibly take more than 2 weeks for three workers with a couple of ladders to complete?

I hope it rains rains rains all summer!

new2hood

I would like to add a vote to the "more garbage cans" comments here. What up with their absence anyway?

charlesbklyn

Subject: Ridiculous!

This is ridiculous. Why doesn't the DOT change several blocks at a time, giving notice the week before?
Why can't they change these signs quickly? (They are just screwed into the post.)
Why is the DOT, and including the DOB, DOE and several other agencies, so poorly run and organized?

Is this just another example of the incompetence of the DOT?

I think NOT.

I believe this is the DOT getting back at Park Slope for rejecting their proposal to re-align the avenues toward the atlantic yards developement. These types of decisions should end when Mr. Weiner wins the mayorship, and our neighborhood is represented by power in government.

scottb2k

Don't count on it being that long. Noone wants the revenue stream to dry up or the dog shit pile up so you'll be surprised how quickly signs can be changed.

I know most people don't think that the sweepers do anything, but believe it or not they do...some streets are going to look terrible in a few weeks.

I've lived through several DOT sign changes and the way they usually end these situations is by keeping the completion of the change on the DL and then flooding the area with tow trucks the first day back.

tieyourshoes

Count me as another one who thinks this won't be as great as it sounds.
What it will do is attract the people from the surrounding neighborhoods (South Slope, Prospect Heights) who don't use their cars all that much to use PS as a giant parking lot. Just that many more spots with no turnover.

sharpie

South Slope is included in the alternate-side-of-the-street-parking free zone so you won't have to worry about our smelly cars clogging up your parking spots.

Thinking for myself, if, say, Windsor Terrace was a free parking zone, unless I were within a very short walk (I'm not) it would never occur to me or be worth it to me to park there. I'd rather have my car within a few block radius and move it a couple of times a week than travel in order to...travel.

tieyourshoes

I meant south of 15th St., but yeah, keep your smelly cars to yourself.

I also would not walk that far, but if you border the no suspended alternate side neighborhoods, it's not necessarily a long walk. And I'm sure there are plenty of people that would rather walk a little further every few weeks than have to move their car twice in three hours every week.

sloper

Before anyone gets too excited or angry - I called the DOT....this might only last for 2 or 3 weeks. I know the articles say the entire summer, but right now they don't know how long. I'm going away and paying for a spot for my car b/c i'll get back the 3rd week after this has started and this may or may not still be in effect.

Consider yourself warned if you're planning on leaving town and keeping your car on the street...

arches

sloper wrote: Before anyone gets too excited or angry - I called the DOT....this might only last for 2 or 3 weeks...

DOT needs to get their message straight, it seems...

From NYT article (http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/15/nyregion/15parking.html?hp)

"Asked how long indefinitely will be, Seth Solomonow, a spokesman for the city’s Department of Transportation, said, 'A few months.' "

bluecat

One interesting bit from the NYTimes article: it seems they are printing the signs as they roll them out. Idiots. No wonder it's taking them weeks or months to roll out the new signage.

armchair_warrior

haven't read any replies yet. but wanna to add street cleaning is a joke, just pushing dirt around.

brooklynpotter

14th is the cutoff, there WILL be alternate side parking on 15th. because we need the extra traffic of people moving cars

daver

Lol. Park Slope parking watch.
Gowanus Lounge

longtimesloper

For what it's worth-I have used my car every single day since Sunday and I have come home to find parking spots on my actual block within 5 minutes each day.

There were times when it would take me anywhere from 30 to 45 minutes (especially on a Monday night) to find parking on my block.

new2hood

I've had an unnatural curiousity about what's going to happen with this, but my totally unscientific and random observances have been pretty neutral in terms of more or less spots open. The summer lightening-up of traffic is probably going to make this a non-issue. That's my guess.

daver

Interesting Streetsblog post here.

But how's this for a hypothesis: A measurable amount of New York City's traffic congestion, at least in some neighborhoods, is created by car owners moving their vehicles to comply with alternate side parking regulations. Eliminating or changing the regulations could help to reduce traffic congestion, vehicle miles traveled, pollution and carbon emissions on New York City's streets.

brooklynpotter

and i'm up there with long time sloper: parking has abounded in the past few days. and it HAS been a whole lot quieter. or that could be my imagination

garfunky

i wasnt too thrilled to hear this on the radio

"alternate side is in effect today everywhere except park slope"

why not just send out some flyers to the tristate area letting em know about free longterm parking ....

j0518

I dreaded actually pulling my car out of its spot now when I needed it the other night. While it was hard to find a parking spot when we got back, it was probably more due to it being hard to find any sort of spot on a Wednesday at 1:00 AM than cars that won't budge all summer. So far, so good.....maybe.

jeffrey

It being Memorial Day long weekend, I am guessing that the streets will empty and there will be parking galore everywhere, after about 6p this evening.

Anyone not leaving town, this weekend's your best opportunity to get prime parking for the month. (lawl)

daver

Even though it’ll be a summer of no “No parking,” Slope car owners are already seeing how difficult it is to find spots.

Take Jim Anderson. He left his prime spot Monday morning to run a quick errand, but was unable to find a good spot upon his return.
Brooklyn Bridge Realty

“I thought with the rules lifted, that wouldn’t be the case,” he said.

And many residents — car owners and non-drivers alike — think their cool, tree-lined streets will turn into Brooklyn’s hot new parking lot.

Brooklyn Paper

On the plus side the people who are now more than ever reluctant to move their cars may become greater users of mass transit. As an automobile becomes little more than a stationary object good only for admiring the way it looks standing at a not-to-be-yielded curbside space, its owner may even consider taking a bus – a much disparaged object that is getting some new and more positive attention.

Brooklyn Daily Eagle

carmen

We're still parking on our street-cleaning blocks (on 14th and 15th) and yes, its a pain in the butt however it's MUCH easier to find parking on these blocks late-night now. We used to drive around for 45 minutes looking for a spot, now there's almost always one on a second pass.

caaahyoko

Don't know if it had anything to do with the no-alt side thing, but there were a sh*t load of cars double parked on the way home today. Tons on 5th ave past 6th or 7th, and like 5 on 15th st between 5th ave and 4th.

bluecat

Beginning 3rd week of no-alt-parking in the Slope. Anybody see DOT posting the new 90 minute signs this was all about?

brooklynpotter

ah, grasshopper. patience. they were talking about no alt-side parking all summer.

daver

Garfunky wrote: i wasnt too thrilled to hear this on the radio

"alternate side is in effect today everywhere except park slope"

why not just send out some flyers to the tristate area letting em know about free longterm parking ....

Da radio this morning said, "ALTERNATE SIDE PARKING IS IN EFFECT TODAY, EXCEPT FOR SOME PARKS OF PARK SLOPE blah blah blah."

FYI.

new2hood

There are new signs up on the east side of PPW, and there was a sign guy at 6th St and 8th Ave getting ready to install this morning.

garfunky

daver wrote: [quote=Garfunky]i wasnt too thrilled to hear this on the radio

"alternate side is in effect today everywhere except park slope"

why not just send out some flyers to the tristate area letting em know about free longterm parking ....

Da radio this morning said, "ALTERNATE SIDE PARKING IS IN EFFECT TODAY, EXCEPT FOR SOME PARKS OF PARK SLOPE blah blah blah."
FYI.

thanks , i think ...
:?
so now the parks of park slope no longer have alternate side parking?